15th of Season of Fire, 57th year of the 32nd cycle
Newt felt like banging his head against a rock. Elder Woodhopper may have appeared like she was enjoying the spring of her youth, but she was his master’s generation. The whole situation felt absurd. He had a crush on a woman who was at least a thousand years his senior.
“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” he muttered and saw the Chamber of Tomes.
Rocks.
He turned and marched over to the door, his cheeks still burning.
“Good day,” he greeted the librarian, and spent the next couple of hours studying geology, focused on igneous rocks. There were two more types of rocks, but they were incompatible with the concept of magma or lava. And why the different names? They were basically the same molten rock as far as Newt was concerned.
An interesting fact he learned was that lava was rich in metal, much richer than the earth element on average. Newt knew the tidbit could prove useful one day, and he might be able to add metal, often classified as yin-earth, to his arsenal.
The mundane books proved fascinating and boring at the same time. The ideas and general concepts tickled Newt’s mind, then devolved into irrelevant tripe about specific weight of volcanic rocks found in different regions, and their appliance in metallurgy, masonry, and other aspects of life.
Newt was additionally disappointed because he expected that the denser rocks had greater concentration of spiritual energy, but that was not the case. In fact, the data he had glossed over suggested there was no correlation between the rock’s physical properties and the density of spiritual energy.
Newt’s stomach thundered, and he snapped the book shut in embarrassment. He glanced around the reading room catching a few odd glances before rushing out.
“Sorry,” he whispered to Elder Thunderwing as he returned the books. “Could you please tell me where I can get something to eat?”
The old librarian trained her gaze on Newt, making him want to shrink back. She took a moment to decide Newt was not joking. “You will have to visit the outer disciple ward. Just follow your nose once you get there.”
Newt thanked the elder, and walked into the night, certain his face was glowing red in the dark. He was not alone. Fireflies bobbed up and down in the air, probably making even bigger fools of themselves than he was.
Why am I thinking such stupid things? Newt bit his cheek on the inside and tried to clear his mind while hurrying towards the main road.
He followed it back towards the beach and took a left at a sign saying Outer Sect.
Newt expected a bunch of barracks, or dormitories, like the one for inner disciples, but instead, a large, chaotic village of tents and small houses made of straw and wood appeared before him. Torches burned, their dancing flames casting flickering lights. The scene was surreal. The settlement was more primitive than most mortal hamlets Newt had seen.
While his eyes drank in the sight, his nose devoured the scent of grilled fish mixed with unknown, sweetish odors. Newt’s stomach growled once more, and he followed the delicious aroma.
The buildings, large and small, were scattered about without order. Newt guessed most of them were residences, but the larger ones were shops and taverns. Despite the late hour, he passed two dozen people, most of whom were at the second realm, but some of them were at the third, with one elderly man even being at the fourth.
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The gray-haired man wore the sect’s colors, and he was using a fan made of branches and leaves to fan the coals, above which fish sizzled. Newt gulped, saliva running in his mouth like a torrent.
“Good evening.” Newt was confused. How should he address the man? Senior because he was older and in a higher realm? But Newt was an inner disciple, while the old man was an outer disciple.
While Newt pondered, the silence dragged on, until adding any appellation would seem weird.
“Good evening.” The old man returned Newt’s nervous smile with a calm one. “What can I get you?”
He stopped fanning and gestured with his fan, pointing at the whole bunch of eel-like fish sizzling atop his grill and a dozen skewers at the edges of the grill, lined with cubes of whitish meat and multicolored something in similar format.
“What are those?”
“These are haikouichthys,” the “merchant” identified the whole fish first then pointed at the skewers. “And these are diced coelacanths, crabs, and pineapples, seasoned with a secret mix of spices and dressings I have developed over the centuries. Care to try one?”
Newt swallowed his saliva, but did not move to take the offered skewer.
“How do I pay?”
“In goods and services. Money has no meaning here, but various trinkets do, or you could catch some fish for me to sell in exchange for the food.”
Catch fish? Newt had no idea how he was supposed to do that, but he knew that everyone would ask something from him in exchange for food.
He hesitated, standing there like a statue, wondering whether he should tell the “merchant” that he was new and still trying to figure things out. Then his gaze drifted to the shimmering coals, and an idea struck him.
“I could make a spell formation which would replace the coals. But scribing it for a mere skewer of food isn’t happening.” Newt did his best to imitate Dandelion’s speech, the hesitant and aloof offer, with barely a hint of interest in the subject, before supposedly realizing that what he offered was too good for the other party. He just hoped his stomach would not betray him and remain silent.
His plan worked. The merchant’s eyes went wide in realization. “I pay two skewers a day for the coals. I could pay you one skewer a day from now on.”
Newt felt smug about the way he handled the matter and raised six fingers to match half the number of skewers on the grill. “Six skewers upfront, and you have to provide me with a metal plate and some acid to scribe the spell formation with.”
The merchant shoved the six skewers into Newt’s hands. “Deal. Wait here for a while, I need to find the materials you will need.”
Newt watched the man hurry away and bit into the first stick. The fish melted in his mouth, salty with faint hot notes. Newt wanted to cry with how hungry he was. It was even worse than when he was at the mines. At least he had bread back then, and the bland meat was never anything he would look forward to, while the difference between weeks of hunger and a spicy, succulent coelacanth was like night and day.
Then he bit into the chunk of crab meat. It was firmer, chewier, glazed in a sweet and sour sauce that felt like a divine tonic. Newt’s stomach growled as he chomped on the sweet fruit, quickly followed by another piece of fish.
He sat beside the grill and gorged himself. By the time the merchant returned, Newt was long finished with his meal, his fingers fully licked. He was sated, but still had some room in him, and he regretted not getting some haikouichthys as a part of the deal.
“Here you go.” The man handed Newt a metal plate a foot long and a foot wide, as well as a glass vial of greenish-orange liquid, which might have been plain pale-green in daylight.
Newt examined his tools, taking the black plate into his hands. It could have been bigger, but the ambient spiritual energy was rich enough, and he could make it work with two instead of four runes for gathering energy from the environment.
He would replace the burst rune from his killing formation with flow, so the heat would not build up, but instead radiate upwards at all times. Newt plotted the spell formation as he considered his task, the knowledge of runes and their arrangements he used to cultivate his realm incomparably more complex and intricate than a grill.
To him the task at hand was a minor thought exercise, but most guild scribes of his level would have resorted to already existing spell formations, rather than invent one on the spot by repurposing a lethal trap.
With the spell formation plotted out, he uncorked the acid and scrunched his brows at the vile smell. He formed Granite Crust to cover his hand and projected it two inches away from his skin before dripping the caustic liquid onto the tip of Granite Crust’s index finger.
Newt counted to ten, but other than a minor increase in spiritual energy consumption, the mundane acid could not harm his defense. Newt pulled back Granite Crust to cling to his skin, dipped his finger into the acid, and started drawing under the merchant’s watchful eye.